Modern portable consumer and industrial electronics provide increasing levels of functionality to support modern life including location-based information services. This is especially true for client devices such as navigation systems, cellular phones, portable digital assistants, and multifunction devices.
As users adopt mobile location based service devices, new and old usage begin to take advantage of this new device space. There are many solutions to take advantage of this new device opportunity. One existing approach is to use location information to provide location based services, such as a global positioning service (GPS) location based system for a mobile device. Solutions include capabilities such as point-to-point route selection, turn-by-turn navigation guidance, and provision of point of interest information.
In response to consumer demand, location based systems are providing ever-increasing amounts of information requiring these systems to handle more and more data. This information includes map data, business data, local weather, and local driving conditions. The demand also exists to provide organization or filtering of location based information. The demand for more information and the need to remain current continue to challenge the providers of location based systems.
Thus, a need remains for a location based system to provide organization or filtering of location based information. In view of the ever-increasing commercial competitive pressures, along with growing consumer expectations and the diminishing opportunities for meaningful product differentiation in the marketplace, it is critical that answers be found for these problems. Additionally, the need to reduce costs, improve efficiencies and performance, and meet competitive pressures adds an even greater urgency to the critical necessity for finding answers to these problems.
Solutions to these problems have been long sought but prior developments have not taught or suggested any solutions and, thus, solutions to these problems have long eluded those skilled in the art.